


blind love in dark bedrooms

by tgtchm



Category: The Grand Tour (TV) RPF, Top Gear (UK) RPF
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Episode Related, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-13
Updated: 2018-01-13
Packaged: 2019-03-04 04:00:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13356054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tgtchm/pseuds/tgtchm
Summary: In which Richard doth protest too much, Jeremy is oblivious, and things come to a head in a hotel room somewhere in Lapland.





	blind love in dark bedrooms

**Author's Note:**

> written for 2017 secret santa and set around Season 1 Episode 6 of The Grand Tour
> 
> prompt: Something with the rolling pins from last year's christmas episode.

“Still don’t see why I have to have a carrot,” Richard grumbles, looking down at it.

Jeremy doesn’t even bother to stifle his grin. He’s particularly proud of this segment—rubbish car gifts always went down well back on _Top Gear_ , and he’s glad they can continue it, albeit with their own twist that the BBC would have, no doubt, forbidden—even if it’s a bit on-the-nose. “You just don’t understand comedy,” he replies, but winks at Richard just to watch him flush.

They have to be careful on set; it’s been a few months, now, and they’re so used to being quietly physical in the space of their own homes—casual touches that would give too much away in public—that separating themselves during filming is always difficult. Somehow they’ve managed, and Jeremy thinks that no one is any the wiser, not even James—but then, that’s not a surprise, since he doubts James would believe them anyway even if they came right out and said “yes, we’ve been shagging, have done for quite some time, isn’t that a nice surprise?”. Jeremy isn’t even sure if _shagging_ is the right word for frenzied handjobs in his living room (neither of them having the inclination to move to the bedroom) followed by awkward goodbyes that linger, but he doesn’t know how else to describe it, really. He finds himself aching for more sometimes (shamefully often, actually), but doesn’t even know how to begin saying it. They’re caught in some sort of limbo, friends who fuck, friends who dance around each other, friends who refuse to verbalise what they may be feeling—not that they make a habit of it ordinarily—and it’s starting to drive him slightly mad.

James holds up the thick wooden dowel he’s been assigned, condom already pre-applied, and grins widely. “I certainly don’t have any complaints.”

“Yeah, well, you wouldn’t,” Richard grumbles, placing the carrot back down on the table, somehow making the movement as petulant as possible. “I’m not _that_ small.”

Taking the opportunity—there’s no one else looking in their direction, really, so it’s probably safe enough—Jeremy claps Richard on the shoulder and shoots him a grin that’s wide and smug. “Don’t worry. I’m sure you’re not small where it counts.”

It’s worth it to see his face turn a variety of expressions in just a few seconds—it goes from amusement to shock, once he realises James is listening in, then to anger—and without saying another word he storms off (to where, Jeremy isn’t sure, but considering the weather outside he can’t go far), anger rolling from him in waves. James and Jeremy just watch him go, Jeremy with amusement and James with clearly-telegraphed confusion.

“I really do not understand that man,” James sighs, turning away to place his dowel back on the table, neatening it so it lies straight.

Jeremy casts his eyes over the Christmas-themed corner of the tent once more, folding his arms as he contemplates. “Nor do I, James. Nor do I.”

*

Filming goes well and even the condom segment goes off without a hitch. He and Richard banter back and forth— “Look, you’re not gonna be here to help me when I’m using it, are you!” “You don’t know!”—playing it up for the cameras easily but with an undercurrent of amusement between them, born of the fact that this may well be a situation they find themselves in one day soon, even though neither of them has ever even remotely hinted at such a thing because somehow doing that means they aren’t just mates who wank each other off anymore.

Except Richard, for some reason, keeps making jokes about Jeremy’s rolling pin.

It starts when they’re wrapping up after filming. Jeremy first spots him from across the tent as he talks to James, condom-clad rolling pin in hand as he makes lewd gestures with it; Jeremy watches with amusement for a moment before turning away. Even from here he can see how animated Richard is. When he gets like this he always flings himself at Jeremy, explosive and passionate, and just the thought of that has him closing his eyes and taking a deep breath so he doesn’t get hard in the midst of everyone packing up the tent around him.

“Pub?” he asks a few minutes later once he’s sidled up to them, certain he has his lust under control; James turns to him with both hands stuffed in his pockets and nods, and Richard—thankfully minus rolling pin—makes noises of agreement. “Do either of you even know where the pub is?”

“I think Andy does,” Richard supplies. “Hopefully. I need to warm up.”

“You know, drinking alcohol is actually proven to _lower_ your body temperature, not raise it,” James points out as they pull their coats on.

“What about those Saint Bernards? Bringing brandy to people stuck in avalanches?” Jeremy asks, and then makes a choked noise as they step outside and into the cold. “Christ. I’d kill for some right now.”

“Top Gear Dog 2? Or rather Grand Tour Dog?” Richard suggests, hunching down inside his coat.

He looks so small that for a second—just one second that nearly ruins it all—Jeremy considers putting an arm around him. Thankfully, he comes to his senses and realises James is on his other side and will most certainly make something of that, and keeps his arms to himself, albeit with difficulty. The urge to touch Richard, to lay hands on his skin—he always runs so hot, hotter than Jeremy does—and feel him beating beneath his hands, burning up, is so overwhelming sometimes he can barely stand it and faintly, as they head towards their cars, he wonders if it’s like that for Richard sometimes, too.

*

They manage to find a pub and sequester themselves in. Richard’s as animated as ever, his eyes bright as he laughs with James, but his legs are tangled with Jeremy’s underneath the table and whenever he gets the chance he shoots glances Jeremy’s way, glances that are heavy and laden with something that makes Jeremy’s breath hitch. This thing between them is, usually, strictly confined to Jeremy’s flat or Richard’s place. They’ve never done anything while on tour, although with Richard being like this—flirty, batting his eyelashes at Jeremy when James isn’t looking—all the reasons why they shouldn’t seem very hard to find.

“Do you think we’re doing well?” he finds himself asking when they’re all a few pints deep and the world is starting to go pleasantly fuzzy around the edges. “With the show, I mean. Do you think it’ll go over ok?”

It’s a moment of stark vulnerability, but they both turn to him with smiles and he feels reassured before either of them even say a word. After all, they have seen him at his worst over the past year and a half; having a bit of a moan in the pub doesn’t even come close to that. “I think so,” James says, thoughtfully. “Obviously we won’t know until the edit and all of that. But I think we’re doing what we want to, and that will shine through.”

“What he said.” Meeting Jeremy’s eyes, Richard nods, the look they share having some weight that Jeremy is too tipsy to try to identify. “Well. I didn’t exactly want to put a condom on a carrot, but you know what I mean.”

Jeremy snorts into his pint. “And there you go again. If I’d known this segment would have given you a bloody complex I would have told Andy to scrap it—”

“I don’t have a complex! I just think it’s not fair that you both get rolling pins and I got a carrot—”

“Mine was a dowel, actually,” James interjects calmly. The both of them turn to look at him and he just shrugs. “Carry on.”

“Are you actually, truly offended, Hammond?” Jeremy leans forward, hyper aware of the way Richard leans in, too. “Because, I hate to break it to you, but we’ve been making fun of your size for years.”

Richard concedes, and leans back in his seat; Jeremy can tell he’s not really offended, is just making a fuss for the sake of it, but he’s not sure why he’s chosen this hill out of all the others to die on. “No,” he admits, “but it’s fun to complain about. It _wasn’t_ fun seeing you manhandle that poor rolling pin though. Don’t think I’ll get that image out of my head any time soon.”

“Oh, you loved it,” Jeremy says dismissively, and turns to James to change the subject.

Under the dim lights of the pub he doesn’t notice how, just for a moment, Richard flushes a deep red; he doesn’t see how his comment seems to have hit just a bit too close to home.

*

They pack it in around one, late enough considering they have a flight tomorrow but still early enough to justify to whomever asks that they were good and went to bed at a reasonable time, really, promise. The pub is close to the hotel they’re all staying at so they stumble there, their shoes crunching on the snow, not saying a word because it’s just too bloody cold for that.

“See you tomorrow,” James mumbles, waving lazily as he slots his keycard into his door.

Jeremy raises a hand back as he pushes open his own door, calling out, “Night, Richard,” as he goes, and only gets as far as one step inside before Richard barrels into him from behind, slamming the door shut after him.

“What—” he manages to get out as he turns, but then Richard shoves him hard and he’s propelled, back-first, into the nearest wall.

As it turns out, being manhandled like this—by titchy Richard Hammond, no less—is apparently a turn on. He only manages to get a glimpse of Richard’s face before he throws himself at Jeremy, and his expression is so choked by lust it damn near stops Jeremy’s heart. He kisses Richard back desperately, hungrily, and somehow he knows this is different from all those other times on his sofa, and not just because they’re in some god-forsaken town where the sun never rises.

“Fucking arsehole,” Richard spits, but there’s no venom in it and Jeremy just laughs. “Don’t, you prick.”

“What have I done now?” he asks, somewhat faintly as Richard’s deft fingers push his jacket off his shoulders and go for his shirt buttons, and, figuring he should return the favour if they’re really going to do this, mirrors Richard’s movements. When Richard doesn’t answer right away he works a hand into his hair and tugs, the way he knows he likes it. “Tell me, so I can do it again.”

Richard pauses from where he’s struggling with one of the buttons and bites his lip. It’s not a gesture intended to be sensual—although Jeremy’s heart nearly leaps into his throat at the sight of it—but rather one of embarrassment. Even in the dim light Jeremy can see that Richard is blushing. What on earth? Is he having second thoughts? “You,” he starts, and his voice is low and gravelly the way it gets when he’s really driven mad by lust, and Jeremy shivers. “You, with that fucking—rolling pin—d’you know what it did to me when—” He shudders, shame and want mixing together into something that has him on the verge of falling apart underneath Jeremy’s hands. “I had to stand there and watch you roll a condom over a rolling pin and it shouldn’t’ve turned me on but it did and it made me _want_ you.”

He starts to grin. He can’t help it. If it wasn’t for Richard being so present, pressed up against him, he’d laugh. That hadn’t been his intention when he’d written that particular part in the script, but it’s certainly a not-unwelcome side effect; he doesn’t even get the chance to voice this to Richard, though, because Richard claps a hand over his mouth. “Don’t you dare laugh at me, not now,” he warns.

“You have to admit, it is pretty funny.”

“You’re not getting it!” Richard’s getting shouty, now, which would be fine except Jeremy is hyper aware of how James is on the other side of the same wall they’re pressed against, although hopefully he’s snoring away by now. “I—I _want_ you, Jez. Want you to fuck me. Want to fuck you. I don’t know.”

And he’s speechless. He _wasn’t_ getting it. But now he is, and he can see possibilities unfurling in front of him; things he never really realised he wanted but, now that they’re placed in front of him, threaten to overwhelm him. They stand on the edge of a precipice, he knows. Step over this and they will no longer just be mates who wank each other off. Richard is offering him something more and, hungrily, he closes the distance between them in a kiss that hopefully says all the words that he suddenly can’t find.

They fall to the bed and peel each other from their layers slowly, exploring; in the darkness Jeremy cannot be bothered to be self-conscious and, besides, Richard knew what he looked like when he started this. He’s too busy learning the shape of Richard’s body to care, anyway—how he groans when Jeremy pinches his nipple, how he tips his head back when Jeremy grabs at his arse. He’s all angles and curves, the line of his hip contrasting to the curve of his thigh as he lifts it over Jeremy’s own, and it’s the most fascinating thing Jeremy has ever seen.

“Please tell me you have condoms, because if you don’t I’m gonna have to kill you,” Richard chokes out as Jeremy wraps a hand around his cock, moving deliberately slowly because he knows how much it infuriates him.

Jeremy grins. “I believe I have some of the _Grand Tour_ branded ones somewhere—”

“No,” Richard says, but as Jeremy catches him on the upstroke it trails off into a quiet moan. “ _Please_ not that. That’s about as erotic as James explaining torque.”

“Didn’t realise that’s what did it for you.” Richard swipes at him, lazily, and he reluctantly pulls away and reaches for his jeans. “I’ll have to ask him to do it next time on Conversation Street. It’ll be fun to watch you squirm—”

Richard leans up on his elbows as Jeremy grapples with his wallet. “Jeremy,” he says, and he doesn’t even have to finish: _Jeremy if you do not get over here right now with a condom in your hand I will actually murder you and I will take great pleasure in it_. But Jeremy is frozen at the image of Richard spread lazily on the bed, cock bobbing against his stomach, hair mussed and lips parted.

He does have a condom in here, funnily enough; he felt such a teenager putting one, along with a sachet of lube, in there a few months ago when this thing between them had begun, but he thought it’d be better to have one and never need it than the other way around. He hadn’t ever thought he’d really need to use it, though, hadn’t allowed himself to consider it. Now that he’s got it in hand and Richard’s stroking himself off languidly, though, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes, it all feels very surreal.

The noise that Richard makes when Jeremy slides a finger inside him brings him straight back down to earth, however. He’d thought he’d been addicted to the noises Richard made when Jeremy wanked him off, twisting his wrist at the right moment to make him gasp, watching his chest and neck flush with colour when he came. But this, Richard grinding down onto his fingers, hands tangled in the sheets, begging for more, supersedes _everything_ he knows. By the time he’s got three fingers twisting in and out of Richard he thinks there may be no sweeter sound on earth than this, not even the purr of an engine.

Time moves strangely after that. Richard pushes him up against the headboard, watches as he rolls the condom down his cock—he opens his mouth to ask Richard if he’d perhaps prefer the rolling pin instead but Richard sees it coming and claps a hand over his mouth again, yelping when Jeremy bites his fingers—and then sinks down slowly onto Jeremy’s length, hands braced on Jeremy’s chest. The moment hangs in the air between them, something more than lust, and then when Jeremy flicks his hips upwards Richard’s eyes flutter shut and the feeling is lost. They’re both far too old for this nonsense, he thinks, for doing this for the first time—but then he catches the curve of Richard’s neck when he arches it back, how the flesh of his hips depresses under Jeremy’s fingers, how the noises he makes just get louder and louder with no concern for whomever might be listening in, and finds he just does not care. They pant and sweat together towards climax; when Richard comes his arms give way and he ends up lying on Jeremy’s chest, face buried in Jeremy’s neck, Jeremy’s name falling from his lips in a way that makes Jeremy feel like he’s flying when he’s doing nothing of the sort. His own orgasm hits him almost as an afterthought, but it’s the weight of Richard on his chest that rides him through it.

Afterwards they clean up gingerly, Jeremy on the verge of falling asleep and Richard too boneless to really move properly. When they get into bed—together; Jeremy doesn’t have the heart to kick Richard into his own room—Richard instantly rolls over and pulls Jeremy close like a limpet.

“Do you know, I’ve just thought of what I’ll get you for Christmas,” Jeremy mumbles sleepily, giving in and wrapping an arm loosely around Richard.

“Go on then.”

“I was thinking of a nice rolling pin. I’ll even throw in a _Grand Tour_ branded condom for you.”

“I hate you,” Richard replies, but the way he burrows even closer to Jeremy under the sheets proves that he, in fact, does not. Jeremy sighs contentedly and pulls him closer, his thoughts not on rolling pins or condoms or carrots but on how nice Richard’s goatee feels against his chest, strangely, and how he could get used to this, how perhaps that’s not such a scary thought after all.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm taking a small hiatus from fandom due to real-life stuff but I'll come back once I've a) caught up on grand tour episodes and b) finished the fic I'm currently working on (a ja/r thing about a mustang). see you soon~


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